The Black-crowned Night Heron 



EVERY investigator of cat-tails, and "tules," those giant bulrushes 

 of California, has been startled in his course, at some time or other, by 

 the eruption of an unsuspected company of gray ghosts. They had 

 marked his approach as they stood about in grave dignity, silent, motion- 

 less, and disapproving; but their color had blended so well with that of 

 the cover that the intruder blundered on, unmindful that he was invading 

 precincts sacred to Nycticoracine slumbers. Wawrk, says the bird 

 whose nerves give out first, and wawrk, wawrk, shout the others, now that 



Taken near Los Banos 



AN INFANT MENACE 



THIS YOUNGSTER IN PIN-FEATHERS MEANS TO STAND HIS GROUND 



Photo by the Autho 



the spell is broken. The reeds boil herons and a confusion of gray wings 

 smites the beholder, until the pouting company has reassembled at some 

 distant point and readdressed itself to sleep. 



True to their name, the Black-crowned Night Herons fly and hunt 

 chiefly by night. On this account and because of their throaty notes, 

 they have ever been the objects of superstitious dread on the part of 

 savages; and the sounds which they make are not exactly comforting to 

 the ears of white men, save those of the hardened ornithologist. The 

 well-known cry may sometimes be allowed to pass as quawk (never "qua"), 



1912 



